


new dawns

by abbyleaf101



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Domesticity, M/M, Post-Apocalypse, Soft Apocalypse, Teasing, post 160
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-03
Updated: 2019-11-03
Packaged: 2021-01-22 10:55:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 732
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21300887
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/abbyleaf101/pseuds/abbyleaf101
Summary: It’s stupid. He knows it’s stupid - inconsequential, really, when they can’t even find enough food to feed themselves, shelter that doesn’t try to Bury them, a fire that doesn’t burn too hot with unseen flame, nowhere to escape being Seen, but.He can’t stop himself from looking, anyhow.(Or: Jon and Martin, after the apocalypse. In a library.)
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims
Comments: 12
Kudos: 151





	new dawns

**Author's Note:**

> Set some time after the events of 160. Jon and Martin and the apocalypse - making a life together, making do, maybe even making their own kind of traditions 
> 
> No content warnings, beyond a few canon-typical references to the Fears

It’s stupid. He knows it’s stupid - inconsequential, really, when they can’t even find enough food to feed themselves, shelter that doesn’t try to Bury them, a fire that doesn’t burn too hot with unseen flame, nowhere to escape being Seen, but.

He can’t stop himself from looking, anyhow. 

They manage to find a public library, the day Martin finds what he’s been looking for, however many days after the end of the world. It’s hard to keep track, what with The Dark playing havoc with the day/night cycle. Probably somewhere a room of dusty academics are arguing about how to reconstruct time, debating metaphysics and - ha - dark matter, but for now - 

For now, Jon is holding his hand, and that’s all that matters. 

The library is a resource run, primarily, as they work their way back down the country. The food bank bin has already been ransacked, as has the water cooler behind what remains of the circulation desk. They’ll need to do a second sweep looking for pencils and paper, anything they can use for kindling, maybe there will be some tea lurking in the staff’s desk drawers, hidden away. The vending machine in the corner is broken and unlit but - crucially - full. It’s the work of a moment to finish tipping the thing over and neatly push an ice pick through the front, picking the packs of chocolate and claggy flapjacks and mints out of the glass shards. He steps over the remains of the Returns trolley, suppressing a remember shiver at the  _ Bone Turners Tale _ \- at least the Fears have less need for books, now, probably? Still, probably better to use the tongs in his backpack before he picks anything up - 

Oh. 

_ Oh.  _

Martin is still sitting in the same place on the slightly mouldering floor when Jon comes back from ransacking the shelves, several large, hardback books clutched in his hands. 

“I wasn’t sure what - that is, I just got a selection, some of the gardening and survival stuff you - oh. Martin,  _ what is that _ ?” Jon’s voice, driven sharp and accustory by concern and fear, poorly expressed, finally drags him out of the awed reverie he’d fallen into. 

“Oh - a polaroid.” He laughs, and lifts the bulky contraption in his hands, the boxes of unopened and undamaged film in his lap. “I wasn’t - I can’t quite believe I found one.” Another laugh, and Martin’s face splits into a delighted grin, peering up at Jon in a way he doesn’t get to often, cheeks dimpled and face open in easy, uncomplicated happiness. “It’s stupid, I know it’s stupid, but - we don’t have anything, anymore. None of the photographs we took, my books, my vintage knitting needles… my poetry, although that might be a blessing.” 

Jon shakes his head and sits down, too, legs crossed under him and sitting across from Martin, expression warm and gentle and serious. “I like it, even if it is over-enamoured with Keats,” a familiar tease. 

Martin laughs, again. “Well, be that as it may, I thought - well. Well the polaroids where the only thing the Not Them couldn’t change, right? Analogue, or whatever. But also I just like them, retro charm, you know -” another dimpled smile over the bulky plastic casing, because even here Martin can find something joyful in the necessity of avoiding the Fears that stalk them all, one Jon can’t help but echo - “and I wanted… well. We could use them to record information, right? Addresses, names, things we know are true, can pass them onto other survivors, but - but I want to. I want to remember your face, our faces. I want to know we were together, and it was real. If - if something happens.” 

“Oh.” Jon’s expression is soft, broken open. “Oh. That’s - yes.” He coughs, looks down at the books scattered around him. “I found these. I don’t know if they’ll help, but…” He presses the piles into Martin’s hands, a silent offering. 

Martin holds them against his chest - knitting patterns, an old manual for basic electronics, a few battered volumes of poetry with scrawled annotations in the margins, a children’s encyclopedia about spiders. Martin can’t speak, for a moment, overcome with the feeling of - of letting himself be seen, and of knowing he let Jon do the looking, welcomed it. 

“Thank you,” Martin says, still smiling, and leans forward to press that smile against Jon’s lips.   
  



End file.
